Vara Vara Rao's wife taps Supreme Court

Hyderabad: Activist and poet P Varavara Rao's wife P Hemalatha has written an open letter to Chief Justice of India (CJI) Ranjan Gogoiseeking his intervention for release ofhis husband, keeping his age and ailing health in view and speed up the trial.

On Tuesday at a meeting held at Somajiguda, Hemalatha's open letter was endorsed by about 100 intellectuals in Hyderabad and Telangana. The letter was also posted on the online petitions site www.change.org and more than 670 people from all over the world endorsed it till 5 pm on Tuesday.

The letter was unveiled before the media by Chukka Ramaiah and PotturiVenkateswara Rao and the letter would be submitted to CJI by Professor G Haragopal.

Hemalatha said Varavara Rao, the 79-year old revolutionary writer and Left ideologue is shown as an accused, along with others, in Bhima Koregaon violence case which was later extended to plotting to assassinate Prime Minister Narendra Modi, which he and his family have denied vehemently and then to the Unlawful Activities Prevention Act.

"While he has nothing to do with the initial Bhima Koregaon violence, the later extensions are based on obviously fabricated evidence. The turns and twists in the history of the case amply show mala fide intentions of the police and I strongly suspect that my husband is implicated in the case just to silence his voice" she added.

She also said, "as his wife for 55 years and all those who know him are sure that he never ever involved himself in any criminal activity in his 79 years of life.

His innocence or non-involvement in criminal activities is not only our belief as his family members, friends, colleagues, students and admirers, but also pronounced by various law courts of the land."

"He was implicated in as many as 25 cases in the last 45 years and out of these 25 cases, the courts set him free finding him not guilty in 13 cases after years of prolonged trial and the other 12 cases were withdrawn by the State even before trial. Two conspiracy cases, one went on for 15 years and other for 17 years, finally ended in his acquittal," she added.

"This is a clear proof that the prosecution could not prove a single charge in a single case against him. However, he had to spend more than seven years of his precious life in various prisons as an under-trial prisoner," Hemalatha said in the letter.

Speaking to the media, Chukka Ramaiah, PotturiVenkateswara Rao, Professor Haragopal and Devulapalli Amar said Varavara Rao's freedom of expression and movement are curtailed and restricted for the last seven months without any substantial basis and just because police created some fictitious evidence.

While it should be 'bail is rule and jail is exception' according to principles of natural justice, Varavara Rao and his eight co-accused are incarcerated for seven to nine months.

In this situation, this petition seeks immediate release of Varavara Rao, keeping his age and ailing health in view, even while the trial continues according to procedure.

IJU president Devulapalli Amar also said that truth is that leaders of right wing are the actual culprits in the Bhima Koregaon vandalism. Right wing leaders are trying to stifle the voice of voiceless which is anti-socialism.